On the new episode of “Song Exploder”—a podcast hosted by The One AM Radio’s Hrishikesh Hirway that delves into the making of specific songs—Fleet Foxes’ Robin Pecknold discussed the track “Mearcstapa” from their excellent new album Crack-Up. Pecknold discussed wanting to make the song “feel like a Beach Boys song with a Can song being played on top of it.” He also spoke about alternate tunings used in the song, Ali Farka Touré’s influence, the merits of acoustic versus electric guitar, and its evocative references to sailing, a sometime vocation of his father’s. He also explained that the song’s title, which means “border walker,” was in part inspired by the sailor Bernard Moitessier. Fleet Foxes recently performed songs from the Helplessness Blues follow-up LP on “CBS This Morning: Saturday” and “The Late Show With Stephen Colbert.”